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Sunday, April 27, 2014

I've loved listening to a wide breadth and high volume of music since people were confused about the legality of pirating digital music - pirating is a word with many connotations. Well OK, since mixed-tapes but I don't always admit that. Now I'm a happy Google Play Music subscriber and listen to all kinds of music. I would like to share some of them with you every month.

This is my April Playlist - the songs that I played most this month whether or not they are new releases. I'm not going to write exciting critiques because I lack nearly ever bit of musical training that would allow me to do that. I'm just a guy who loves fresh tunes. Here's this month:

Arcade Fire - Normal Person
Reflektor was the first single I saw and didn't hit home with me right away, but Normal Person is my favorite song of the year so far.

The Black Keys - Fever
When this single was released I was pretty disappointed. I love The Black Keys for the "dirty" rock sound they've always had and felt this picked up on more trendy sounds. After hearing it through a couple times I've picked out the classic Black Keys sounds and like how some of the new sounds mix in. I am really excited for the full album release in a couple weeks.

Neon Trees - Text Me in the Morning
This won't be the biggest hit off the album, but I thought it was one of the more fun. I wish they would have actually tucked it back a bit further in the album because I felt they needed a little more energy in the second half. There was no YouTube release for this one, so I'm share the Play Music link.

James Blunt - Postcards
I almost went with Miss America which is what got me to even try out Blunt's new offering, Moon Landing. Postcards is a fantastic track though, and won my heart. Clever lyrics are the key to my heart and sending his feelings on a postcard because he "doesn't care who sees what I send" is the kind of unabashed feeling we all wish we had about something from time to time.

Arctic Monkeys - Knee Socks
You knew I was going here when I said the clever lyrics thing about Postcards right? She's strutting around the house is his sky blue Lacoste and knee socks!!! This album has probably had the most plays for me this year and I plan to be in attendance when these guys play on the lake this summer in Milwaukee.

American Authors - Trouble
I played the EP like an addict when it came out last fall, so it was hard to get back into songs that I willfully overplayed when the full album came out. But Trouble is fresh and awesome and I'm glad they saved it.

St. Vincent - Digital Witness
The sounds all the way through this song just keep me coming back for more. This whole album is great, but Digital Witness was the song I first heard and it certainly earns cornerstone status on the album.

PHOX - Slow Motion
I've taken great satisfaction in listening to local artists in the past year and PHOX has me excited for they debut album with this great single. I'm anticipating my go-to hammock soundtrack.

I'll keep this short as sort of a bookmark showing a return to public posting.

I've been writing privately much more than ever before for the past year, and as a result feel the most prepared to write publicly that I ever have. I've been working on a number of writing projects and hope to start sharing some of those soon.

As for today, I'll get the ball rolling with a new thing I'd like to do - sharing a monthly playlist of songs that I just couldn't get enough of each month. They won't all be new songs, just the songs that I played over and over all month.